The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge develops and defends an empiricist approach to mathematical knowledge. After offering an account of a priori knowledge, it argues that none of the ...
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The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge develops and defends an empiricist approach to mathematical knowledge. After offering an account of a priori knowledge, it argues that none of the available accounts of a priori mathematical knowledge is viable. It then constructs an approach to the content of mathematical statements, viewing mathematics as grounded in our manipulations of physical reality. From these crude beginnings, mathematics unfolds through the successive modifications of mathematical practice, spurred by the presence of unsolved problems. This process of unfolding is considered in general, and illustrated by considering the historical development of analysis from the seventeenth century to the end of the nineteenth.Less

The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge

Philip Kitcher

Published in print: 1985-04-11

The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge develops and defends an empiricist approach to mathematical knowledge. After offering an account of a priori knowledge, it argues that none of the available accounts of a priori mathematical knowledge is viable. It then constructs an approach to the content of mathematical statements, viewing mathematics as grounded in our manipulations of physical reality. From these crude beginnings, mathematics unfolds through the successive modifications of mathematical practice, spurred by the presence of unsolved problems. This process of unfolding is considered in general, and illustrated by considering the historical development of analysis from the seventeenth century to the end of the nineteenth.

The second important element of Wyclif’s philosophical program is his metaphysics, which is an important response to Ockhamist conceptualism. Walter Burley had challenged Ockhamist ontology with a ...
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The second important element of Wyclif’s philosophical program is his metaphysics, which is an important response to Ockhamist conceptualism. Walter Burley had challenged Ockhamist ontology with a vivid realist metaphysics, and Adam Wodeham had been an important Oxford defender of Ockhamism in the years prior to Wyclif; both figure importantly in the philosophical context of Wyclif’s philosophy. Wyclif’s ontology arose from his logic, which was not in itself a departure from Aristotelian logic; what characterizes Wyclif’s innovation is his “propositional realism,” interpreting all reality in the form of propositions. He formulated his philosophy of Being as such, and his understanding of the Divine Ideas and their relation to Universals in creation, in light of his belief in an isomorphism between language and reality. The central idea behind the following chapters is that Wyclif’s theological vision is best understood in terms of this propositional realism.Less

WYCLIF IN OXFORD : Logic, Metaphysics

Stephen E. Lahey

Published in print: 2009-05-01

The second important element of Wyclif’s philosophical program is his metaphysics, which is an important response to Ockhamist conceptualism. Walter Burley had challenged Ockhamist ontology with a vivid realist metaphysics, and Adam Wodeham had been an important Oxford defender of Ockhamism in the years prior to Wyclif; both figure importantly in the philosophical context of Wyclif’s philosophy. Wyclif’s ontology arose from his logic, which was not in itself a departure from Aristotelian logic; what characterizes Wyclif’s innovation is his “propositional realism,” interpreting all reality in the form of propositions. He formulated his philosophy of Being as such, and his understanding of the Divine Ideas and their relation to Universals in creation, in light of his belief in an isomorphism between language and reality. The central idea behind the following chapters is that Wyclif’s theological vision is best understood in terms of this propositional realism.

The hybrid theory of reference developed in Chapter 2 has important consequences for our understanding of metaphysical claims about identity, persistence, and modality, which are drawn out in this ...
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The hybrid theory of reference developed in Chapter 2 has important consequences for our understanding of metaphysical claims about identity, persistence, and modality, which are drawn out in this chapter. Specifically, it leads to the view that the most basic conditions of existence, identity, and persistence for the objects we refer to are discoverable by a kind of conceptual analysis, and the most basic claims about these conditions are analytic. This in turn leads to the conceptualist view that the most basic modal claims are likewise analytic. Conventionalist views are often said (e.g., by Michael Rea and Crawford Elder) to lead to objectual anti-realism, but it is argued that modal conceptualism clearly does not. Moreover, modal conceptualism is independently appealing, since it can help soften epistemic and ontological worries about modality.Less

Identity, Persistence, and Modality

Amie L. Thomasson

Published in print: 2007-10-01

The hybrid theory of reference developed in Chapter 2 has important consequences for our understanding of metaphysical claims about identity, persistence, and modality, which are drawn out in this chapter. Specifically, it leads to the view that the most basic conditions of existence, identity, and persistence for the objects we refer to are discoverable by a kind of conceptual analysis, and the most basic claims about these conditions are analytic. This in turn leads to the conceptualist view that the most basic modal claims are likewise analytic. Conventionalist views are often said (e.g., by Michael Rea and Crawford Elder) to lead to objectual anti-realism, but it is argued that modal conceptualism clearly does not. Moreover, modal conceptualism is independently appealing, since it can help soften epistemic and ontological worries about modality.

The introductory chapter lays out the motivations for defending a common sense ontology and provides an overview of the various eliminativist arguments against ordinary objects that will be discussed ...
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The introductory chapter lays out the motivations for defending a common sense ontology and provides an overview of the various eliminativist arguments against ordinary objects that will be discussed in the book. It also describes the argument strategy of the book: the early chapters (2 and 3) argue for central views about reference and modality — namely, a hybrid approach to reference, and a conceptualist understanding of modality. But the later chapters provide the most important evidence for these views by demonstrating their ability to defuse all of the arguments against ordinary objects, and to make sense of our common sense world view nonproblematically. The book closes by sketching important metaontological results of the above work regarding which metaphysical questions are and are not answerable, and what methods should be employed in pursuing them.Less

Introduction

Amie L. Thomasson

Published in print: 2007-10-01

The introductory chapter lays out the motivations for defending a common sense ontology and provides an overview of the various eliminativist arguments against ordinary objects that will be discussed in the book. It also describes the argument strategy of the book: the early chapters (2 and 3) argue for central views about reference and modality — namely, a hybrid approach to reference, and a conceptualist understanding of modality. But the later chapters provide the most important evidence for these views by demonstrating their ability to defuse all of the arguments against ordinary objects, and to make sense of our common sense world view nonproblematically. The book closes by sketching important metaontological results of the above work regarding which metaphysical questions are and are not answerable, and what methods should be employed in pursuing them.

This chapter sets out four broad ways to handle the conflicts displayed by the Introduction. One might argue that necessary truths have no ontology. One might argue that the theist claims that the ...
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This chapter sets out four broad ways to handle the conflicts displayed by the Introduction. One might argue that necessary truths have no ontology. One might argue that the theist claims that the conflicts involve really have a restricted scope — that they say only that God is the source of (say) concrete things and that no concrete thing is co-eternal with Him. This would let one claim that necessary truths’ ontology falls outside this scope and again, the conflicts do not really arise. One might argue that necessary truths have only a ‘safe’ ontology — one that does not actually create the conflicts; safe ontologies considered include conventionalism, conceptualism, and non-divine powers theories. The last approach, which it recommends, is to bring God into the ontology of necessary truth.Less

Some solutions

Brian Leftow

Published in print: 2012-09-06

This chapter sets out four broad ways to handle the conflicts displayed by the Introduction. One might argue that necessary truths have no ontology. One might argue that the theist claims that the conflicts involve really have a restricted scope — that they say only that God is the source of (say) concrete things and that no concrete thing is co-eternal with Him. This would let one claim that necessary truths’ ontology falls outside this scope and again, the conflicts do not really arise. One might argue that necessary truths have only a ‘safe’ ontology — one that does not actually create the conflicts; safe ontologies considered include conventionalism, conceptualism, and non-divine powers theories. The last approach, which it recommends, is to bring God into the ontology of necessary truth.

Poincaré had recommended a ‘Vicious Circle Principle’, and Russell accepted this in his final ‘ramified’ theory of types. He claims both that this principle resolves a range of paradoxes (including ...
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Poincaré had recommended a ‘Vicious Circle Principle’, and Russell accepted this in his final ‘ramified’ theory of types. He claims both that this principle resolves a range of paradoxes (including those concerning propositions that were earlier unresolved), and that it has a certain ‘consonance with common sense’. The first claim, which deals with ‘self-reference’ and ‘self-quantification’, is acceptable, but the solution offered is somewhat extravagant. The second apparently requires a conceptualist approach to abstract objects. (Principia Mathematica seems to sidestep this requirement, but the alternative justification which it offers is clearly faulty.) The Vicious Circle Principle introduces many problems for Russell’s derivation of mathematics, which he overcomes only by introducing an axiom of reducibility. This, he thinks, gives him all the right results: it still blocks the so-called ‘semantic’ paradoxes, but also allows the deduction of mathematics.Less

The Contradiction (iii): A Ramified Solution

David Bostock

Published in print: 2012-04-19

Poincaré had recommended a ‘Vicious Circle Principle’, and Russell accepted this in his final ‘ramified’ theory of types. He claims both that this principle resolves a range of paradoxes (including those concerning propositions that were earlier unresolved), and that it has a certain ‘consonance with common sense’. The first claim, which deals with ‘self-reference’ and ‘self-quantification’, is acceptable, but the solution offered is somewhat extravagant. The second apparently requires a conceptualist approach to abstract objects. (Principia Mathematica seems to sidestep this requirement, but the alternative justification which it offers is clearly faulty.) The Vicious Circle Principle introduces many problems for Russell’s derivation of mathematics, which he overcomes only by introducing an axiom of reducibility. This, he thinks, gives him all the right results: it still blocks the so-called ‘semantic’ paradoxes, but also allows the deduction of mathematics.

The synthetic proposition: Conceptualism and the political referent in contemporary art examines the impact of Civil Rights, Black Power, the student, feminist and the sexual-liberty movements on ...
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The synthetic proposition: Conceptualism and the political referent in contemporary art examines the impact of Civil Rights, Black Power, the student, feminist and the sexual-liberty movements on conceptualism and its legacies in the United States between the late 1960s and the present. It focuses on the turn to political reference in practices originally concerned with philosophically abstract ideas, and traces key strategies in contemporary art today to the reciprocal influences of conceptualism and identity politics, movements that have so far been historicized as mutually exclusive. It demonstrates that while identity-based strategies were particular, their impact spread far beyond the individuals or communities that originated them. Commencing with the early oeuvre of Adrian Piper, a first generation Conceptual artist, this book offers a study of interlocutors that expanded the practice into a broad notion of conceptualism, including Joseph Kosuth, David Hammons, Renée Green, Mary Kelly, Martha Rosler, Silvia Kolbowski, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Lorna Simpson, Hans Haacke, Andrea Fraser, and Charles Gaines. By turning to social issues, these artists analyzed the cultural conventions embedded in modes of reference and representation such as language, writing, photography, moving image, or installation and exhibition display.Less

The Synthetic Proposition : Conceptualism and the Political Referent in Contemporary Art

Nizan Shaked

Published in print: 2017-07-30

The synthetic proposition: Conceptualism and the political referent in contemporary art examines the impact of Civil Rights, Black Power, the student, feminist and the sexual-liberty movements on conceptualism and its legacies in the United States between the late 1960s and the present. It focuses on the turn to political reference in practices originally concerned with philosophically abstract ideas, and traces key strategies in contemporary art today to the reciprocal influences of conceptualism and identity politics, movements that have so far been historicized as mutually exclusive. It demonstrates that while identity-based strategies were particular, their impact spread far beyond the individuals or communities that originated them. Commencing with the early oeuvre of Adrian Piper, a first generation Conceptual artist, this book offers a study of interlocutors that expanded the practice into a broad notion of conceptualism, including Joseph Kosuth, David Hammons, Renée Green, Mary Kelly, Martha Rosler, Silvia Kolbowski, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Lorna Simpson, Hans Haacke, Andrea Fraser, and Charles Gaines. By turning to social issues, these artists analyzed the cultural conventions embedded in modes of reference and representation such as language, writing, photography, moving image, or installation and exhibition display.

Engendering an avant-garde: the unsettled landscapes of Vancouver photo-conceptualism is the first book to comprehensively examine the origins of Vancouver photo-conceptualism in its regional context ...
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Engendering an avant-garde: the unsettled landscapes of Vancouver photo-conceptualism is the first book to comprehensively examine the origins of Vancouver photo-conceptualism in its regional context between 1968 and 1990. Employing discourse analysis of texts written by and about artists, feminist critique, and settler colonial theory, the book discusses the historical transition from artists’ creation of ‘defeatured landscapes’ between 1968-1971 to their cinematographic photographs of the late 1970s, and the backlash against such work by other artists in the late 1980s. This book analyses Jeff Wall and Ian Wallace’s strategic framing of their photography as avant-garde, and considers their rejection of the history of regional landscape painting (such as Emily Carr’s work), the rejection of the counter-cultural experiments of their peers, and the integration of feminist challenges to figurative representation into their work. It is the first study to provide a structural accounting for why the group remains all-male. It accomplishes this by demonstrating that the importation of a European discourse of avant-garde activity, which assumed masculine social privilege and public activity, effectively excluded women artists from membership. In doing so, it intervenes in formalist art critics’ validation of the technical innovation of the Vancouver School as a universal phenomenon of global importance by revealing the social exclusions that empowered it in the past and continue to invest it with authority. This book will appeal to scholars and students interested in Canadian art history, photography, the history of the avant-garde, and the role visual culture plays in establishing and maintaining control over discursive and physical territories.Less

Engendering an avant-garde : The unsettled lansdcapes of Vancouver photo-conceptualism

Leah Modigliani

Published in print: 2018-06-01

Engendering an avant-garde: the unsettled landscapes of Vancouver photo-conceptualism is the first book to comprehensively examine the origins of Vancouver photo-conceptualism in its regional context between 1968 and 1990. Employing discourse analysis of texts written by and about artists, feminist critique, and settler colonial theory, the book discusses the historical transition from artists’ creation of ‘defeatured landscapes’ between 1968-1971 to their cinematographic photographs of the late 1970s, and the backlash against such work by other artists in the late 1980s. This book analyses Jeff Wall and Ian Wallace’s strategic framing of their photography as avant-garde, and considers their rejection of the history of regional landscape painting (such as Emily Carr’s work), the rejection of the counter-cultural experiments of their peers, and the integration of feminist challenges to figurative representation into their work. It is the first study to provide a structural accounting for why the group remains all-male. It accomplishes this by demonstrating that the importation of a European discourse of avant-garde activity, which assumed masculine social privilege and public activity, effectively excluded women artists from membership. In doing so, it intervenes in formalist art critics’ validation of the technical innovation of the Vancouver School as a universal phenomenon of global importance by revealing the social exclusions that empowered it in the past and continue to invest it with authority. This book will appeal to scholars and students interested in Canadian art history, photography, the history of the avant-garde, and the role visual culture plays in establishing and maintaining control over discursive and physical territories.

Chapter 5 is a ficto-critical piece on Conceptualism dedicated to the anthropologist Michael Taussig. It provides an overview of the critical literature on allegory after 1950. It is part collage, ...
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Chapter 5 is a ficto-critical piece on Conceptualism dedicated to the anthropologist Michael Taussig. It provides an overview of the critical literature on allegory after 1950. It is part collage, part fantasy, part critique, part appropriated and overwritten text, and itself includes several short allegories of the Conceptual poetry scene. It focuses critically on pieces from Craig Dworkin’s Strand, which it reads as classic postmodern allegorical transcodings between poetry and other discourses.Less

Fictocritical Postlude : The Melancholy of Conceptualism

Michael Golston

Published in print: 2015-08-18

Chapter 5 is a ficto-critical piece on Conceptualism dedicated to the anthropologist Michael Taussig. It provides an overview of the critical literature on allegory after 1950. It is part collage, part fantasy, part critique, part appropriated and overwritten text, and itself includes several short allegories of the Conceptual poetry scene. It focuses critically on pieces from Craig Dworkin’s Strand, which it reads as classic postmodern allegorical transcodings between poetry and other discourses.

This chapter focuses on conceptual artist Adrian Piper’s dense explorations of objecthood and her bold experiments with disorientation, self-estrangement, and becoming a confrontational art object. ...
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This chapter focuses on conceptual artist Adrian Piper’s dense explorations of objecthood and her bold experiments with disorientation, self-estrangement, and becoming a confrontational art object. Utilizing Daphne Brooks’s concept of “afro-alienation,” it argues that Piper’s complex praxis of self-observation and an aggressive non-identification with her audience is suggestive of a strategic self-alienation employed by black historical actors, albeit in the halcyon days of 1970s performance art. Building on conceptual art’s emphasis on ideas and process, and minimalism’s antipathy towards formal art objects, Piper deftly manipulates her body as artwork and as a catalytic agent for audiences. This chapter maps Piper’s unique traversal from Minimalism to Conceptualism to performance art, to reveal her agile attempts at aesthetic mobility. Following this, the chapter briefly ponders Piper’s relationship to incipient notions of “feminist art” and “black art.” It, then, focus on two sets of Piper’s lesser-known performances—the Aretha Franklin Catalysis (1972) and The Spectator Series (1973). Both lead to The Mythic Being performances (1973-75), in which Piper dressed as a third-world male avatar in blaxplotation-esque attire, before ceasing street performances and shifting to a strictly visual icon. The chapter dissects the various artistic strategies and ideological aims of The Mythic Being performances, posters, and advertisements. Finally, the chapter concludes with a discussion of Piper’s very public withdrawal of her work from the 2013 exhibition “Radical Presence,” arguing that the tactical removal of her work is in closer dialogue with her larger corpus, than we may initially think.Less

Plastic Possibilities : Adrian Piper’s Adamant Self-Alienation

Uri McMillan

Published in print: 2012-04-23

This chapter focuses on conceptual artist Adrian Piper’s dense explorations of objecthood and her bold experiments with disorientation, self-estrangement, and becoming a confrontational art object. Utilizing Daphne Brooks’s concept of “afro-alienation,” it argues that Piper’s complex praxis of self-observation and an aggressive non-identification with her audience is suggestive of a strategic self-alienation employed by black historical actors, albeit in the halcyon days of 1970s performance art. Building on conceptual art’s emphasis on ideas and process, and minimalism’s antipathy towards formal art objects, Piper deftly manipulates her body as artwork and as a catalytic agent for audiences. This chapter maps Piper’s unique traversal from Minimalism to Conceptualism to performance art, to reveal her agile attempts at aesthetic mobility. Following this, the chapter briefly ponders Piper’s relationship to incipient notions of “feminist art” and “black art.” It, then, focus on two sets of Piper’s lesser-known performances—the Aretha Franklin Catalysis (1972) and The Spectator Series (1973). Both lead to The Mythic Being performances (1973-75), in which Piper dressed as a third-world male avatar in blaxplotation-esque attire, before ceasing street performances and shifting to a strictly visual icon. The chapter dissects the various artistic strategies and ideological aims of The Mythic Being performances, posters, and advertisements. Finally, the chapter concludes with a discussion of Piper’s very public withdrawal of her work from the 2013 exhibition “Radical Presence,” arguing that the tactical removal of her work is in closer dialogue with her larger corpus, than we may initially think.

This chapter argues that only the functional model of reduction provides both reduction and reductive explanation. Some philosophers believe that even if reduction is not possible, reductive ...
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This chapter argues that only the functional model of reduction provides both reduction and reductive explanation. Some philosophers believe that even if reduction is not possible, reductive explanations are still feasible. But what really is a ‘reductive’ explanation? And how are reduction and reductive explanation related to each other? The chapter discusses these and related questions for the three principal types of reduction: bridge-law reduction, identity reduction, and functional reduction. It argues that bridge-law reduction gives us neither reduction nor reductive explanation and that identity reductions do reduce, but they also eliminate a need for such explanations. In contrast, functional reductions deliver reductive explanations and they yield token reductions. Concerning the properties supposedly reduced through functionalisation, the chapter settles for ‘functional property conceptualism’, which appears to be a form of eliminativism.Less

Reduction and Reductive Explanation: Is One Possible Without the Other?

Jaegwon Kim

Published in print: 2008-09-04

This chapter argues that only the functional model of reduction provides both reduction and reductive explanation. Some philosophers believe that even if reduction is not possible, reductive explanations are still feasible. But what really is a ‘reductive’ explanation? And how are reduction and reductive explanation related to each other? The chapter discusses these and related questions for the three principal types of reduction: bridge-law reduction, identity reduction, and functional reduction. It argues that bridge-law reduction gives us neither reduction nor reductive explanation and that identity reductions do reduce, but they also eliminate a need for such explanations. In contrast, functional reductions deliver reductive explanations and they yield token reductions. Concerning the properties supposedly reduced through functionalisation, the chapter settles for ‘functional property conceptualism’, which appears to be a form of eliminativism.

This chapter makes a programmatic showing how an evaluative theory of content can meet two constraints: the right substitution conditions for belief contexts, and what it is for words to be ...
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This chapter makes a programmatic showing how an evaluative theory of content can meet two constraints: the right substitution conditions for belief contexts, and what it is for words to be meaningful in the way they are. The chapter attempts to show in outline how to get fine-grained intensionality and a complete philosophy of language. Some constraints are imposed implicitly on how language must be thought of if the evaluative theory of content is correct. The chapter addresses the question of what words have to be doing in belief contexts if they are to be subject to the kind of rich intensionality which plausibility and conceptualism both require, and how it is that words can be subject to such constraints upon intersubstitution. It also defines concept-possession without explicitly relying on the idea of level-one opacity, and shows how little help a semantic theory can be in explaining opacity.Less

Word-Meaning and Opacity

Michael Morris

Published in print: 1992-11-05

This chapter makes a programmatic showing how an evaluative theory of content can meet two constraints: the right substitution conditions for belief contexts, and what it is for words to be meaningful in the way they are. The chapter attempts to show in outline how to get fine-grained intensionality and a complete philosophy of language. Some constraints are imposed implicitly on how language must be thought of if the evaluative theory of content is correct. The chapter addresses the question of what words have to be doing in belief contexts if they are to be subject to the kind of rich intensionality which plausibility and conceptualism both require, and how it is that words can be subject to such constraints upon intersubstitution. It also defines concept-possession without explicitly relying on the idea of level-one opacity, and shows how little help a semantic theory can be in explaining opacity.

This chapter examines the philosophical significance of what is X? questions in the light of traditional philosophical essentialism. It examines two competing approaches to essences, realist, and ...
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This chapter examines the philosophical significance of what is X? questions in the light of traditional philosophical essentialism. It examines two competing approaches to essences, realist, and conceptualist approaches, and an influential Aristotelian approach to the question: what is X? The chapter also argues in support of agnostics, with one proviso. It asks whether we have any non-question begging evidence for realism or for idealism, and it answers no. In contrast, the chapter raises doubts about any semantic shortcut to a rejection of realism. It finds no ground to conclude that realism or idealism is meaningless. When non-question begging evidence is at issue, agnosticism gives epistemically proper treatment to the evidence we have: evidence that decides in favor of neither realism nor idealism. This is the main lesson of this first chapter. The chapter recommends philosophy without presumed objectivity.Less

Ontology, Evidence, and Philosophical Questions

Paul K. Moser

Published in print: 1993-09-16

This chapter examines the philosophical significance of what is X? questions in the light of traditional philosophical essentialism. It examines two competing approaches to essences, realist, and conceptualist approaches, and an influential Aristotelian approach to the question: what is X? The chapter also argues in support of agnostics, with one proviso. It asks whether we have any non-question begging evidence for realism or for idealism, and it answers no. In contrast, the chapter raises doubts about any semantic shortcut to a rejection of realism. It finds no ground to conclude that realism or idealism is meaningless. When non-question begging evidence is at issue, agnosticism gives epistemically proper treatment to the evidence we have: evidence that decides in favor of neither realism nor idealism. This is the main lesson of this first chapter. The chapter recommends philosophy without presumed objectivity.

This chapter aims to provide a philosophical theory of content. ‘Content’ here means conceptual content—the content of propositional attitudes. A conception of what philosophical theories should do ...
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This chapter aims to provide a philosophical theory of content. ‘Content’ here means conceptual content—the content of propositional attitudes. A conception of what philosophical theories should do presupposes a very general metaphysical science. The fundamental objections to the resulting theories trace back to the adoption of the contentious metaphysics of ‘naturalism’. Conceptualism, Platoism, and No-Theory view are the three fundamental approaches to metaphysical issues. What is needed is the development of a general metaphysical theory to provide the constraints that a philosophical theory of content must meet. A developed form of conceptualism is the best general metaphysical theory. This chapter hopes to provide a philosophical theory (or analysis, or reduction) of any particular subject that should accept this general theory.Less

Philosophical Theories and Metaphysical Schemes

Michael Morris

Published in print: 1992-11-05

This chapter aims to provide a philosophical theory of content. ‘Content’ here means conceptual content—the content of propositional attitudes. A conception of what philosophical theories should do presupposes a very general metaphysical science. The fundamental objections to the resulting theories trace back to the adoption of the contentious metaphysics of ‘naturalism’. Conceptualism, Platoism, and No-Theory view are the three fundamental approaches to metaphysical issues. What is needed is the development of a general metaphysical theory to provide the constraints that a philosophical theory of content must meet. A developed form of conceptualism is the best general metaphysical theory. This chapter hopes to provide a philosophical theory (or analysis, or reduction) of any particular subject that should accept this general theory.

This chapter suggests that ‘interest’ in conceptualism's tenet is naturally read in line with something like Kant's conception of a scientific metaphysics. It is the one which may issue from and be ...
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This chapter suggests that ‘interest’ in conceptualism's tenet is naturally read in line with something like Kant's conception of a scientific metaphysics. It is the one which may issue from and be testable by a scientific general metaphysical theory. Scientific general metaphysical theory incorporates an operable condition of adequacy for metaphysical explanations which enables us to test some metaphysical explanations effectively, and allows us always to imagine the testing of any significant metaphysical explanation. This chapter also argues that the demand for a scientific metaphysics is incompatible with Platonism; and that familiar objections to Platonism presuppose a commitment to something like a scientific metaphysics. Lastly, this chapter tries to undermine two intuitive arguments of Platonism: two inhabitants have different conceptual schemes and two concept-possessors must think about at least some of the same things.Less

Conceptualism is Kantian

Michael Morris

Published in print: 1992-11-05

This chapter suggests that ‘interest’ in conceptualism's tenet is naturally read in line with something like Kant's conception of a scientific metaphysics. It is the one which may issue from and be testable by a scientific general metaphysical theory. Scientific general metaphysical theory incorporates an operable condition of adequacy for metaphysical explanations which enables us to test some metaphysical explanations effectively, and allows us always to imagine the testing of any significant metaphysical explanation. This chapter also argues that the demand for a scientific metaphysics is incompatible with Platonism; and that familiar objections to Platonism presuppose a commitment to something like a scientific metaphysics. Lastly, this chapter tries to undermine two intuitive arguments of Platonism: two inhabitants have different conceptual schemes and two concept-possessors must think about at least some of the same things.

In this chapter, Mackie presents a defence of Locke against Berkeley's attack on abstraction. It is argued that Locke's theory of ideas primarily concerns our ability to employ words and statements. ...
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In this chapter, Mackie presents a defence of Locke against Berkeley's attack on abstraction. It is argued that Locke's theory of ideas primarily concerns our ability to employ words and statements. Locke's theory concerning ideas of numbers is criticized. Three theories of universals are considered: realism, nominalism, and conceptualism; it is concluded, however, that the notion of there being distinct things with which we connect general words with particular things is mistaken. Mackie instead proposes a theory of general words being ‘annexed’ to features of things.Less

Abstract Ideas and Universals

J. L. Mackie

Published in print: 1976-05-06

In this chapter, Mackie presents a defence of Locke against Berkeley's attack on abstraction. It is argued that Locke's theory of ideas primarily concerns our ability to employ words and statements. Locke's theory concerning ideas of numbers is criticized. Three theories of universals are considered: realism, nominalism, and conceptualism; it is concluded, however, that the notion of there being distinct things with which we connect general words with particular things is mistaken. Mackie instead proposes a theory of general words being ‘annexed’ to features of things.

If we are to obtain a priori mathematical knowledge by following proofs, then we have to be able to have a priori knowledge of the axioms. This chapter continues Chapter 3's examination of the major ...
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If we are to obtain a priori mathematical knowledge by following proofs, then we have to be able to have a priori knowledge of the axioms. This chapter continues Chapter 3's examination of the major accounts of how such knowledge might be gained. It is argued that all these accounts fail.Less

Conceptualism

Philip Kitcher

Published in print: 1985-04-11

If we are to obtain a priori mathematical knowledge by following proofs, then we have to be able to have a priori knowledge of the axioms. This chapter continues Chapter 3's examination of the major accounts of how such knowledge might be gained. It is argued that all these accounts fail.

Begins the second part of the book, in which the author argues that commitment to the naturalistic research programme precludes one from accepting realism about material objects and materialism. The ...
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Begins the second part of the book, in which the author argues that commitment to the naturalistic research programme precludes one from accepting realism about material objects and materialism. The argument turns on the prospects (or lack thereof) that naturalists have for solving what the author calls the Discovery Problem. Roughly, the Discovery Problem is just the fact that intrinsic modal properties seem not to be discoverable by the methods of science. Describes this problem in Ch. 4, and argues that if there is good reason to think that the problem cannot be solved, then naturalists cannot be justified in accepting realism about material objects.Less

The Discovery Problem

Michael C. Rea

Published in print: 2002-08-01

Begins the second part of the book, in which the author argues that commitment to the naturalistic research programme precludes one from accepting realism about material objects and materialism. The argument turns on the prospects (or lack thereof) that naturalists have for solving what the author calls the Discovery Problem. Roughly, the Discovery Problem is just the fact that intrinsic modal properties seem not to be discoverable by the methods of science. Describes this problem in Ch. 4, and argues that if there is good reason to think that the problem cannot be solved, then naturalists cannot be justified in accepting realism about material objects.

Consciousness is arguably the most important area within contemporary philosophy of mind and perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the world. Despite an explosion of research from philosophers, ...
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Consciousness is arguably the most important area within contemporary philosophy of mind and perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the world. Despite an explosion of research from philosophers, psychologists, and scientists, attempts to explain consciousness in neurophysiological, or even cognitive, terms are often met with great resistance. This book aims to solve an underlying paradox, namely, how it is possible to hold a number of seemingly inconsistent views, including higher-order thought (HOT) theory, conceptualism, infant and animal consciousness, concept acquisition, and what the book calls the HOT-brain thesis. It defends and further develops a metapsychological reductive representational theory of consciousness and applies it to several importantly related problems. The book proposes a version of the HOT theory of consciousness that the text calls the “wide intrinsicality view” and shows why it is superior to various alternatives, such as self-representationalism and first-order representationalism. HOT theory says that what makes a mental state conscious is that a suitable higher-order thought is directed at that mental state. Thus it argues for an overall philosophical theory of consciousness while applying it to other significant issues not usually addressed in the philosophical literature on consciousness. Most cognitive science and empirical works on such topics as concepts and animal consciousness do not address central philosophical theories of consciousness. The book’s integration of empirical and philosophical concerns will make its argument of interest to both philosophers and nonphilosophers.Less

Rocco J. Gennaro

Published in print: 2011-11-18

Consciousness is arguably the most important area within contemporary philosophy of mind and perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the world. Despite an explosion of research from philosophers, psychologists, and scientists, attempts to explain consciousness in neurophysiological, or even cognitive, terms are often met with great resistance. This book aims to solve an underlying paradox, namely, how it is possible to hold a number of seemingly inconsistent views, including higher-order thought (HOT) theory, conceptualism, infant and animal consciousness, concept acquisition, and what the book calls the HOT-brain thesis. It defends and further develops a metapsychological reductive representational theory of consciousness and applies it to several importantly related problems. The book proposes a version of the HOT theory of consciousness that the text calls the “wide intrinsicality view” and shows why it is superior to various alternatives, such as self-representationalism and first-order representationalism. HOT theory says that what makes a mental state conscious is that a suitable higher-order thought is directed at that mental state. Thus it argues for an overall philosophical theory of consciousness while applying it to other significant issues not usually addressed in the philosophical literature on consciousness. Most cognitive science and empirical works on such topics as concepts and animal consciousness do not address central philosophical theories of consciousness. The book’s integration of empirical and philosophical concerns will make its argument of interest to both philosophers and nonphilosophers.

This chapter investigates the best means of protecting and promoting human rights. It identifies which human rights are being discussed. It examines the reason for choosing these human rights rather ...
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This chapter investigates the best means of protecting and promoting human rights. It identifies which human rights are being discussed. It examines the reason for choosing these human rights rather than other possible rights as human rights. It provides a definition of human rights. It considers some ways in which to constrict and contain the boundaries of human rights and mentions its expansionism. It determines the roles that human rights are to have in the decision-making processes and what their form and content should be.Less

Human Rights: The Shifting Boundaries

TOM CAMPBELL

Published in print: 2003-10-02

This chapter investigates the best means of protecting and promoting human rights. It identifies which human rights are being discussed. It examines the reason for choosing these human rights rather than other possible rights as human rights. It provides a definition of human rights. It considers some ways in which to constrict and contain the boundaries of human rights and mentions its expansionism. It determines the roles that human rights are to have in the decision-making processes and what their form and content should be.